Mounds View neighbors: Pulte development 'not the right place to build'

Mounds View development causes protest

Neighbors in the northeast metro are continuing their fight to block a wetland area from becoming a residential development. FOX 9’s Courtney Godfrey explains the fight in Mounds View that attracted more than a dozen residents on Monday.

MOUNDS VIEW, Minn. (FOX 9) - Neighbors in Mounds View continue to fight a proposed residential development on what is now natural landscape, as the city continues to move forward with plans.

Pulte Homes wants to build 75 townhomes on nearly eight acres of land in Ardan Park, in an area that is classified as wetland buffer zone.

While the city council continues to consider a deal where they would sell the land to Pulte Homes to make the development possible, neighbors continue their attempts to dissuade city officials from approving the project.

"Its not the right place to build - especially as much as they want to build," said Dan Madsen.

Madsen joined a little more than a dozen other citizens in a protest outside city hall Monday, ahead of the regularly scheduled city council meeting.

The development was not on the agenda for discussion Monday, but organizers say they will continue to show up and flood public comment periods with their opposition.

"They haven’t listened to anything we’ve said," said Heather Schuchard.

Interim mayor Gary Meehlhause declined to comment on the proposal or the protest Monday, saying at this point its "just a proposal."

The city has tried to develop this land multiple times, with developments falling through in both 2005 and 2018.

Citizens say city officials have cited increased tax revenue as one reason to do it.